


As Loud As The Heart

by acquaintedwithvice



Category: The Big Bang Theory (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Drama, F/M, Gaming, Humor, Jealousy, Romance, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-07-27
Updated: 2018-08-18
Packaged: 2019-06-17 09:07:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15457947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acquaintedwithvice/pseuds/acquaintedwithvice
Summary: "Chemistry is the melody you can play on vibrating strings." - Michio Kaku, physicistA series of generally unrelated vignettes illustrating the uncomplicated connection between two complicated individuals. Opposites attract.Playlist: https://8tracks.com/virtueofvice/as-loud-as-the-heart





	1. Covalent

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Trelobita](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trelobita/gifts).

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Penny has accepted a marriage proposal; but Sheldon cannot imagine himself without her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> covalent bond: (noun) also called a molecular bond, is a strong chemical bond that involves the sharing of electron pairs between atoms.

Of all the places she'd expected to find him, the roof was one of the last. 

He was a man of fixed routine, piloting his solitary ship through the perilous waters of everyday life with nary a deviation in course. It was a lonely way to live. The people around him revolved in a familiar pattern but one that was laced with ribbons of chaos - he watched them triumph and fail, forge alliances and revoke attachments; live, grow, love. It had all seemed so distant from himself - he, the eye of the storm in the midst of a swirling microcosm of other people's lives. He observed but did not participate, an explorer from a distant planet; his own prime directive standing in the way of any lasting connection.

And then, there she was.

She had rejected the entire premise from the beginning, chucking his stoicism under the chin as if he were a sullen child. She patiently but firmly refused the notion of himself as separate and apart, drawing him into social interactions with or without his consent. His personal space diminished; forced to grow accustomed to the warmth of her folded limbs and golden hair that reminded him in scent and color of citrus and honey. In time, his natural state was recalibrated; so that he could not be comfortable if she were too far removed. The central axis of his world seemed to have shifted, in a manner that defied every law of physics but nonetheless pulled at the tight, anxious core of him in a way that nauseated him to dwell upon. 

He'd never expected her to choose him, not in the ways that mattered, in the ways the others vied for and tried to capture and keep like pinned butterflies. Her color and life fell on him, playing over him like the dancing glimmer of a prism's refracted rays; but was never his to hold. When the moon is full, telescopes lose their sensitivity, the brilliant silver glow making the intricacies of the constellations fade into an unimportant background. He refused to acknowledge the distraction, the way her light gleamed constantly at the edge of his vision and lured him away from his work; training eyes gone moony with solving starlight to see only her.

She was brilliant in ways he never could be; the effortless queen of all she surveyed. They were two sides of the same coin, polar opposites that had nonetheless shared something betwixt themselves and, in the exchange, become joined. It was obvious in his playfulness and humor; qualities that had for as long as he could remember been buried beneath the weight of his anxieties and the rigorous demands of a busy brain. It was clear in how she fought him stubbornly and how he often gave in; in the way she disarmed him in an instant with a sunny smile and cheerful acquiescence when it cost her nothing to concede. For his entire adult life, he had surrounded himself with people who would not challenge him; weaving his safety net from those he considered lesser minds with little desire to subvert his will. Then Penny came along, Atropos with her shears, and snipped away all that was binding him and all that kept him safe. Her presence began as a distraction, and quickly evolved into a primary need like oxygen or sustenance; something he could never live without.

Three taps on the doorframe that led to the building below; an echoing, conscious or unconscious, of his own patterns. They frequently overlapped thus, their movements synchronized as the slowly revolving stars. Like a covalent molecule, atoms bonded to one another by what they shared; with no room for interlopers, theoretically immune to attempts at destruction.

"Sheldon?"

 _Stars don't move, Penny._  He would have told her; a little pedantic, a little fond.  _It's the earth that rotates on its axis, creating the illusion of motion in the heavens._  But that seemed false, somehow - or rather, it was a truth that existed separate and apart from another truth - that she was the center of his own private universe, and all within it revolved around her. His star; in the way that that the Sun was the Earth's star - free to consume him at any time, himself entirely subject to the force of her gravity and vital light.

"Penny." He studied the concrete beneath his wing-tipped shoes.

It had been surprising to everyone when she'd accepted Leonard's advances; the first and the second and the third time, each somehow more surprising than the last even though an experiment repeated is generally expected to yield the same results. When the proposal of marriage had likewise been accepted, it seemed to at last cement the unbalanced equation they represented into tenuous reality, for no one seemed surprised any longer. He'd felt a rare resentment, then; a kind of helpless, isolated fury in the center of a passively benevolent sea. The general air of congratulatory approval permeated his little corner of the galaxy, and he found it difficult to breathe. The sight of his erstwhile best friend's hand, pressing as if in beneficent ownership to the small of her back, drove him from the apartment and to the rooftop. He had slipped out sometime between the decanting of the champagne and the first toast; and had assumed no one would regret or even note his absence.

Yet another fallacy. "You okay?" The distant streetlights and the full moon cast contrasting shadows in her hair and against the curve of her neck. She did not appear different, in the way that young brides-to-be are ostensibly supposed to. She was not blushing, apple-ripe; her lingering gaze like a cool breeze on his skin, entirely lucid and not dreamy and faraway in visions of white gowns and marital bliss. In short, she appeared much as she always had. The notion was cold comfort but he took it anyway.

"I'm not  _not_  okay." He lied, baby blues still downcast. He fidgeted a little, hands in his pockets; as bad at deception as ever but giving it the old college try. It was the right thing to do - Leonard was his oldest friend, and filled a function in his life that could never be replaced or replicated. Despite the boiling resentment that choked him every time the other scientist would, like an infant learning a new word, repeat the phrase  _"my fiancee"..._  At his sides, thin hands curled into fists, then uncurled. It would be easier, perhaps, if he were a pugilist; a man with bravery and testosterone to spare - and none of the burdens and boundaries imposed by his powerful mind. It was not the first time he had longed to be stupid - curled up on the floor, a sobbing child, his father wielding a belt over him; or alone in a corner at Sunday school, sitting indecorously perched with his long legs and knobbly knees on the Time-Out Stool and desperately needing the restroom (which was denied, to his humiliation). There were many times throughout his life that he had wished for the curse of his intelligence to be lifted; moments so full of pain and isolation that he would subscribe for an instant to the adage "ignorance is bliss." But he had never before wished it so fervently. 

Long fingers tapped impatiently against the smooth fabric of his trousers, waiting for her to leave - to shrug her shoulders at how impossible he was, at his cold distance, at his inability to meld to the social constructs that ruled the rest of them. It was the simplest solution to an equation he had seen many times; almost always ending with one variable left outstanding - himself, naturally. He had too many sharp edges, was too inconveniently angled to really fit anywhere. 

He was so focused on willing her away that he didn't notice when she drew nearer; immune to the power of his mind in this as in all things. She rested her hand on his forearm, warm through the thin fabric of his thermal and feather-light, as if soothing a spooked horse. Nebraska, Texas. Far enough apart that he had never heard of, never dreamed of a girl named Penny - but along the same meridian, farms and fields spinning under the same stars; both displaced travelers looking up in the brisk night air and wishing for freedom. Warm sunshine in the summer, hazy golden midges and the smell of hot hay and dust in his nose, making him sneeze. Honeysuckle and wild blueberries. She never tried, was incapable of being anything she was not; but somehow even the scent of her reminded him of home. 

She tapped the back of his wrist three times with her fingertip; a short succession that left a burning imprint in its wake. He suspected that if he were to examine the area under a microscope he would see the brand of her fingerprints; tiny whorls unique, little galaxies tattooed on his skin, marking him as hers. "Sheldon."

"Penny."

"What's wrong?"

 _Will you sing Soft Kitty?_  He had asked, a hundred years ago before it all got so... messy. Cocooned in her bed, out of his comfort zone but comforted nonetheless; her warm presence and soft voice - a little off-key, but familiar and with the edge of fond exasperation he had come to associate with her - calming his fears.  _Homesick is a kind of sick._

All at once he realized he was sick; incurably, terminally. Nausea gripped him and bands of iron tightened around his ribs.  _She_  was home and she was leaving him, and he would never be well again. Something would always be missing; that nagging, hollow ache, as if he were forgetting something but never could.

"Don't marry him." He choked.

Penny froze, gazing up at him - green, flecked with gold; colors of wealth, dependability, compassion, if one followed such hokum - her hand stiff on his arm but still touching him, still  _present._  "What?"

"Please." Fingers slim and long and surprisingly strong, he buried his hands in her hair, silk and sunshine against his skin; and cradled the base of her skull as he brought his lips to hers.

Not his first kiss; though he could count the others on one hand - but he knew immediately he would never kiss anyone else ever again. She hesitated for a long moment, yielding but unresponsive under his touch; before coming to life with a kind of breathy whine that tingled against his lips and made his heart stutter in its cage of selfish flesh and bone. Her hands went to his chest, as if about to pull him away; but instead gripped fistfuls of his t-shirt - Star Sapphire, one of his favorites - and pinioned him tight against her, as if he were a bird that could abruptly flutter away.

He could have told her that was not the case. Even if the kiss, if all of it ended here; he would follow along behind her for eternity, a faithful shadow grateful to be in any way associated with her light. She nipped at his lower lip, small hands now clinging to his shoulders, wrapping around his neck - amazing how petite she seemed in comparison, dwarfed by his six-feet-and-change. Her tongue flickered against the cupid's bow of his upper lip and he groaned softly, abject and undignified and entirely hers. Regret in the soft velvet slide of her mouth against his, she pulled back, peered up at him in the dark from pupils dilated with surprise or desire or both - and wasn't  _that_  a shock, a visceral throb of recognition as he viewed the magnetic attraction that bound them from the perspective of the opposite pole.

She held him, palms pressed flat against his shoulderblades, his skin hot beneath the layers of cotton that separated them; in defiance of the cool autumn night.  _Don't marry him. Please._  And it seemed like there was nothing left to say, like the way he trembled in her arms and the heft of the silence between their lips was enough, would have always been enough. Leonard was his oldest friend; but he did not need him in the same manner; like air and light and answers. He awaited her reply, a being in stasis, ready either to die or to begin anew.

"Okay."

 


	2. Thixotropy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sheldon is tense. Penny has just the solution... And maybe some ulterior motives.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thixotropy: (noun) property of becoming fluid when disturbed

Something was amiss.

By all appearances, the sunny Pasadena lifestyle enjoyed by the residents of 2311 N. Los Robles Avenue was more peaceful than ever. The differing natures of its nonetheless symbiotic residents were functioning in synchronicity like a well-oiled machine - and Penny had been on her best behavior.

Her conduct over the duration of the preceding month had been nothing short of saintly, almost worthy of induction into the color guard. For a solid three weeks and a handful of balmy summer days, she had endured the incredulous stares and leading questions from the other guys (and their respective ladies, where applicable) without comment. Three weeks, catering to the mercurial whims of the alpha nerd. There had been no sitting in Sheldon's seat; blonde invader decamping instead to her now-accustomed spot at his right hand. She beat Leonard to the punch at least weekly, bringing over the preferred orders and quantities of Thai, Chinese, and pizza on their appropriate evenings. And, in perhaps her most magnanimous gesture, Penny ensured that the washers in the laundry room stood empty at 8:15 sharp every Saturday evening, lint traps toothless gray smiles in the hollow faces of the dryers, emptied of fuzz and lost socks.

"Penny, can I ask you a question?" Bernadette inquired softly as they climbed the stairs after an ill-advised hot yoga session for which Penny had been tipped a coupon - unwilling to waste what might have been the most valuable portion of her wages for the previous evening, she had been nonetheless disappointed with how many soccer moms and pick-up artists had been present in the warm, uncomfortably silent gym room.

Penny glanced at her petite blonde friend as they rounded the corner to the third floor, adjusting her purse strap with a pensive look. "That depends." She murmured, resisting eye contact - her secrecy and shyness inordinately pronounced. "If you're going to ask why I'm buttering up Sheldon, the answer is none of your business and I'm not." She blushed furiously and turned her face to hide the irrational reaction.

Bernadette stared at her, bright eyes behind feline frames wide and nonplussed. "I was going to ask if you had a cute top I could borrow for Howie's family reunion next week. ...You're trying to butter up _Sheldon?_ For what?"

"No reason! Thanks Bernadette, I had fun, goodnight!" Over the years and through many unwanted advances, Penny had grown adept at unlocking her front door with her keys held behind her back. Now she disappeared through the suddenly open door, shutting it behind her with a decisive snap.

"Huh." Bernadette commented to no one, and crossed the hall to join her boyfriend and the others assembling for a venerable Wednesday tradition - Halo night.

"Well hey, baby!" Howard rose from the sofa, immediately losing his position to Raj as he embraced his girlfriend in welcome. "Do you want to play Halo with us?"

The little microbiologist thought for a moment, her brow getting the little endearing furrow that said she was struggling with a decision. On the one hand, she was rather curious about Penny's queer behavior and abrupt dismissal. On the other hand, it _was_ Halo night, and she had been meaning to improve her high score. "Sure!" She answered brightly, only to be met with Sheldon tossing his hands up in exasperation.

"This lack of planning is the reason NASA's budget is grossly inflated and yet still inadequate, Wolowitz." The tall scientist scolded, but without any real heat.

The shorter man sighed, pinching the bridge of his aquiline nose as if staving off a migraine. "I know I'm going to regret asking, but why is that?"

"It's impossible to create equal teams from five people." Sheldon paused, gesturing at himself, Leonard, Raj, Howard and Bernadette in turn. "While I admit I alone am sufficient to thoroughly trounce the rest of you-" Here he paused with a breathy snicker, the bazinga implied. "The more ethical solution would be to split into equal teams and then bisect your girlfriend a la King Solomon."

"We are  _not_ bisecting my girlfriend, okay?" The engineer retorted, rolling his eyes. "Why don't you just go over and invite Penny? I saw her unloading some Ben and Jerry's from the grocery store earlier so I know she's home." He chuckled a little unkindly until Bernadette elbowed him in the ribs.

"She is," The pretty little blonde nodded, a little curious as to how the scenario would play out, given the already odd quality of her own most recent interaction with Penny. "Go and get her, Sheldon."

Sheldon glanced away, lips pressed into a thin line. "Ah, excuse me; but I am a theoretical physicist, not a golf caddy - I do not fetch." He paused, fiddled with the spare controller, set it aside and directed his roommate without making eye contact. "Leonard, you retrieve her."

Leonard laughed a bit hollowly. "Sorry bud, I'm underqualified for this mission... In case you haven't noticed, I don't exactly excel at getting Penny."

Sheldon stared at him for a moment as the plaintive, self-deprecating humor went over his head, then frowned a little and dipped his long fingers into the bowl by the front door, retrieving his keys. "Fine." He announced brusquely. "I will return with our sixth player and then, perhaps, Halo night can continue uninterrupted?" Dripping with the disapproval of the personally inconvenienced, he shut the apartment door - a little loudly - behind himself and crossed the hall.

 _Knock, knock, knock._ "Penny."

A pause.

 _Knock, knock, knock._ "Penny."

A pause.

 _Knock, knock, knock._ "Penny."

Like clockwork, the door swung open on the third utterance of her name, and the woman herself stood on the other side, looking a little tired but not unhappy to see him. "What can I do for you, Sheldon?"

Sheldon stared down at her, clearly perplexed by the question. "It's Wednesday."

Penny nodded, making a soft pop with her lips as she replied, "Yep."

"Wednesday is Halo night."

A small smile twitched at the corner of her lips, painted a soft mauve; eyes sparkling as if she were trying not to laugh. Sheldon blinked, prominent adam's apple bobbing as he swallowed nervously and glanced away. She laughed so easily, shared her smile so readily, that it had taken him a very long time to realize that she rarely mocked him in earnest. "Bernadette will be joining us, and it is impossible to form equal teams from an odd number of players." He elaborated; a little rushed, painted over with the faint air of condescension that colored every explanation he offered however well-meaning.

Penny nodded, a contrived frown of sympathy belied by her laughing eyes. "Mmm-hmm." If he wanted her company, she intended to make him work a little. As fond as she'd unexpectedly become of the tall, slender physicist, she couldn't help the way it tickled her pink - as her Nana would say - to see him squirm.

Sheldon huffed impatiently, rolling his eyes in exasperation as if expecting someone to come to his rescue - despite the fact that they were obviously listening at the door, however, no assistance was forthcoming from 4A. "Penny," he eked out, in what he hoped remotely passed for a wheedling tone. "The commencement of Halo night has now been unnecessarily delayed by - " He checked his watch, " - seventeen minutes, which as you know is unacceptable under any circumstances short of power outage, medical emergency or hostile alien invasion."

Affecting the most serious look she could muster, Penny nodded again; pressing her lips together to stop the giggles from overtaking her.

Heedless, looking at the isosceles triangle of carpet outlined by the tips of his shoes, Sheldon continued, voice muted, less sure of himself. "You are a surprisingly competent player, and I would appreciate it if you would join my team so the evening's events can continue without further delay."

Penny was already smiling when he looked up to meet her eyes, the laugh she'd been suppressing bubbling up in her throat as she nodded. "Sure, sweetie." She stepped out of the apartment and shut the door behind herself, not bothering to lock it. As they were crossing the hall, she couldn't resist a little jab at Sheldon's expense. "I know you only want me on your team so I can't kick your butt on Leonard's."

Sheldon glared at her. "I said 'surprisingly competent,' not 'superhuman'." He informed her brusquely, ushering her into 4A as he shut the door behind them. The boys were too busy scrambling to assemble balanced teams so the defense of Earth could begin in earnest, but Bernadette noted the way Sheldon's hand hovered for a moment over the small of Penny's back, a few millimeters of empty space all that kept the subtle gesture from becoming reality. He withdrew it, however, fingers twitching at his side as if singed.

Oblivious, Penny took her customary place at his side, confident and smiling wickedly with the controller in her hands and digital carnage on her mind.

"Okay, let's go!"

~*~*~*~

One by one, the teams splintered as their individual members split off and headed home or to bed; citing work in the morning as an excuse for coitus or gloomy self-abuse. Sheldon was left alone, as he often was, to musingly wash up the dishes and reorganize the living room in the wake of scheduled social activity. In an interesting deviation from the norm, Penny's efforts accompanied his own; as she had lingered behind after the others had gone and now assisted him in drying the dishes with an uncharacteristically thoughtful look on her face.

Contrary to popular opinion, the talented Dr. Cooper was not as oblivious as it would seem to the mores and regulations that seemed to govern the rest of his social group. While her motivations remained a mystery, he was not as incognizant as it would have appeared to Penny's unusually solicitous behavior. What eluded him, however, was her reasoning for said behavior. Setting aside a striped towel after drying his hands, he turned to look at his neighbor, blue eyes wide and sensitive. "Penny."

Penny jumped, almost dropping the glass she held before placing it carefully, rim-side down, in the cabinet over her head. "What's up, buttercup?" She inquired, swiping her damp palms over the soft pile of her favorite jeans to dispel her sudden and unreasonable nervousness.

"Do you need money?" Sheldon asked, gaze politely inquisitive.

Penny's jaw dropped. " _What?_ "

"You've been atypically polite recently," the physicist hurried on, sensing that he'd somehow crossed a line but unsure precisely when or how. "I thought perhaps you were attempting to ingratiate yourself to me in the hopes that I would reward your efforts with financial compensation." Turning on his heel, he crossed the apartment to the shelves near the window, withdrawing a small lockbox that resembled a stormtrooper's head from one of them. "Penny, if you need a loan, there is no need for such an elaborate ruse-"

"Sheldon, no-" Penny laid her hand on his arm to stop him from unscrewing the stormtrooper's neck and removing the small trove inside. "Wait, seriously? ...No," she shook her head, momentarily distracted by the prospect of being able to afford her rent _and_ groceries that month. "No, Sheldon, I don't need money." Her arms went akimbo as she studied him, a little fond, a little frustrated. Even when feeling cooperative, he somehow managed to make everything difficult.

He stared back, stormtrooper head still resting unneeded in his hands. His eyes were wide again, gaze nakedly innocent. "Then why are you being so nice to me?"

Penny's mouth quirked in what might have been a grimace, a little stab beneath her sternum accompanying his words. "No reason. Well. Actually, I need a favor."

He returned the head to the shelf, crossing his arms warily. "I'm not going to retrieve any electronics from any of your friends."

Penny laughed, a little, unable to help herself. At his distrustful scowl, she continued, her hand light on his arm; contact coming so easily to her. He stared at her hand for a moment as she continued. "No, sweetie. I want you to let me give you a massage."

His gaze flicked from her hand to her face, just as perplexed but now with a mild edge of panic. "What? Why?"

"I've been taking a class," she answered brightly, using cheerfulness - the most well-honed weapon in her arsenal from years of service with a smile - to disguise how terrible an idea it probably was. "I'm thinking about going for my license as a massage therapist. I need to practice on a real person." She appealed to his sense of scientific necessity, knowing that it was a long shot regardless of how the argument was presented. Strictly speaking, she had taken a single intro class at a local tech school, but had been invited back for the full course and was considering the idea. She could only be expected to tolerate the Cheesecake Factory for so long, and she hadn't had a callback for even an audition in months. Her motivations for approaching Sheldon, however, were somewhat less than pure.

"How thoughtful of you to consider me," Sheldon inclined his head slightly, a gesture of polite thanks instilled in every Texan youth - useful also in concealing the way his eye twitched with nerves. "No."

Penny gaped, then squealed in mild outrage. " _Please?_ I can't ask anyone else. Raj can't speak to me so that seems like a consent issue. Leonard would make it weird," she grimaced, "And so would Howard, but in a different way." And all that was true, but there was something else; a thrumming warmth that crept over her and consumed her thoughts whenever the tall man was near, and the way the long, slim lines of him made her long to touch his skin.

"Not that I don't relish the idea of another person covering my body with oil and rubbing it-" At her wide-eyed stare he frowned impatiently and clarified, " _Sarcasm._ But no."

"Come on Sheldon," Penny whined, dropping to the armchair in a defeated slump. Sheldon lingered by the entry to the hall as if prepared to escape, arms still loosely crossed in a defensive posture. "You're so uptight it hurts to look at you."

"Flattering." Crossing to the door, he slid the lock open, turning the doorknob and preparing to throw her out. "Still no."

"I'm invoking the friendship favor clause!" She yelped, interrupting him as he opened his mouth to bid her a stern goodnight.

Sheldon froze, stare cold and cautious. "Excuse me?"

She withdrew a folded sheet of paper from her purse, slightly crumpled and with what appeared to be a coffee stain in one corner but still legible. It was a contract between the two of them, drawn up several months previously when Leonard and his car had been laid up after a minor fender-bender that Sheldon vehemently swore he did not cause. In exchange for driving him around Pasadena and the surrounding area with only minimal complaint for a solid ten days, Penny was owed one (1) favor. Knowing his effusive but generally easygoing neighbor, Sheldon had assumed the favor would take the form of, sooner or later, being called upon to repair some virus-infested electronic device - and had prepared himself accordingly. This, however, was another matter entirely.

"I beg your pardon, but the friendship favor clause does not cover intrusions upon my person-"

"The contract says nothing about the nature of the favor owed, nor are any restrictions placed upon it in either nature or duration." Penny stated clearly, grateful (for once) to Priya and her aggravating on-again, off-again attachment to Leonard.

Sheldon glared for a minute, looking for all the world as if steam were about to erupt from his ears, before clamping his jaw - it twitched, a little, as he stifled an irrational argument that would benefit no one. He relied on written contracts and precise requests from those he socialized with, and in this particular case he'd been hoisted on his own petard. "Fine." He snapped, looking down at the floor as he jerked the door open. "Thirty minutes, above the waist. Your apartment, tomorrow night, 9 pm. And I'd thank you to not bandy this information about with the general public." He was furiously red, wearing a defeated frown, but the concession sparked a nervous intrigue that he could not entirely quell.

Penny gaped at him as she edged out the door. "My place?"

Sheldon rolled his eyes. "People can't be in my room, Penny." He cited the rule as if it were obvious. "Goodnight."

The pretty blonde stood in the hall, staring at the door as if it had deceived her in some manner. "My place?" She repeated in a murmur. Then, with a gasp as if she'd been caught out at some misbehavior, she scurried across the hall to begin cleaning.

It was going to take her hours to get the apartment up to Sheldon's standards.

~*~*~*~

Sheldon had to give her credit - she knew how to play a long game. It was unlike her to be so very accommodating, and he had fallen right into the trap. But that was all over now. He balked in the center of her living room, arms crossed, leaning as far back from her as he could get without toppling over backwards. "Coconut oil is _n_ _ot_ an approved skin lubricant-"

"Sheldon!" Penny huffed in exasperation, "It's antimicrobial and antifungal! Read the label!" She thrust the small amber-glass bottle of fractionated coconut oil under his nose.

He peered down at it before sniffing derisively. "So is snake oil but I'm not letting you put that on me, either." He glared from the bottle in her hands to the irritation in her green eyes, expression pinched with distrust.

Penny took a deep breath, shutting her eyes for a moment as she found her calm place - the one she had cultivated specifically for dealing with Sheldon. "You promised me a favor, Sheldon, and I'm calling it in. Now quit stalling and get your butt into my bedroom." She pointed imperiously, hoping for one ill-advised moment that one of the boys had been passing by her door closely enough to hear that comment.

"Your bedroom?!" The physicist squawked, shrinking visibly back from her, all ground lost.

"Well I don't have a real massage table," she shrugged, "Do you think you could squeeze onto my couch?"

"Penny..." He protested feebly, biting his lip disconcertedly.

"Get." She pointed with more emphasis, tapping her foot on the carpet. "Take off your shirt and lie face down. And relax - I changed the sheets. No germs."

He tried to avoid looking over his shoulder at her as he stripped off his t-shirt and thermal and tried to find a position on the freshly made bed that didn't make him feel vulnerable to the point of inciting panic. Though he'd only removed his shirt, he felt more naked than he'd ever been in his life - including the uncomfortable visits to the cold nurse's office on physical exam day in grade school, and every pantsing he'd ever received. He frowned into the pillow, which smelled of fresh linen and the warm citrus of her hair, and turned his head to the side, eyes squeezed shut. He heard her approach, seating herself on a low stool, and the long, heavily silent moment of hesitation; and his shoulders were so tense awaiting the foreign slide of cool oil against his skin that shocked whimpering sound escaped him when her warm fingers ran through his hair instead. The pads of her fingers and her warm palms pressed gently into his skull, rubbing small concentric circles into his scalp. His skin tingled and the hair on the back of his neck rose, and he uttered a short sigh as his parasympathetic nervous system took over.

"Relax," Penny urged softly, thumbs working along his sternocleidomastoid, fingertips pressing into the hollow of his temples, working out the tension that stretched from his trapezius muscles to the occipital protuberance. As her capable hands slid down, thumbs working at the knots beneath the medial ridge of his scapula, he could not help but obey; a heavy sigh escaping him.

"I'm going to use the oil now. Don't freak out." She murmured, and he tensed again, expecting cold, wet unfamiliarity to break the surprising solace of the moment. Again, she surprised him, warm hands only a little slick gliding up his spine from where his trousers rested low on his hips. He gasped quietly, pressing his forehead against his folded arms to hide the way his eyelids fluttered at the sensation. Her fingers, gently sweeping along the planes and angles of his back; firmly kneading the spots where he'd been holding tension so long it had become a part of him - nothing short of magic. He bit his lip, holding his breath as the balls of her thumbs worked at the hard, wiry muscle at the base of his neck and between his shoulderblades.

Thirty minutes were over almost as soon as they'd begun, and Penny regretted not bargaining for more time. He'd desperately needed it, and she felt unfinished. Distantly, she wondered what his reaction would be if she tried to massage his feet, long delicate bones and pale skin exposed to her gentle, probing fingers. _Yeah, right. Just ask him if he'll let you touch his comic books, next._

Gently, she tapped the defined bump of his third cervical vertebra. "If you turn over for me I'll do some craniosacral work."

"More hokum." Sheldon mumbled into the pillow, sounding drugged. He turned his face to hers, blue eyes wide and a little dilated. "I've never been touched like that before." He admitted in a near-whisper. That space behind her ribs twinged again, a little stab of pity. His gaze was so earnest, so unsure, that she knew how true the statement was. The scientist was not a man that inspired closeness, and she knew most people didn't consider making his acquaintance to be worth the effort.

"You needed it, I think."

"Hmm." He grumbled noncommittally, and rolled onto his back as requested. The transition required less argument than she'd been expecting, and she raised a brow at his closed eyes and placid expression - then clamped a hand over her mouth as her gaze roamed lower.

"I..." She cleared her throat softly, mouth suddenly dry. "I could help you with that, too."

"Don't know what you're talking about." He returned, seeming drowsy. Penny bit her lip to hide her smile, though he wasn't looking at her - at least one portion of his anatomy was wide awake. Her hands itched to touch, unreasonably curious about what he was hiding beneath standoffish conceit and an unfashionable wardrobe.

"Oh yeah?" She inquired, tone airy, falsely unconcerned. The hint of a nervous laugh made her voice waver. "I can see ten or eleven clues that tell me you're lying, tiger."

That got his attention. He sat up a little, fixing her with his disapproving stare though he still seemed a little off-kilter. "Now that's just silly, how can there be ten _or_  eleven clues? Either something is a clue or it isn't... Oh." He caught the direction of her gaze and blushed, glancing away. "Eleven and three-quarters." He muttered, devoutly refusing to meet her gaze.

She eyeballed the long shaft clearly outlined beneath the tartan cotton blend, trying not to squirm in her seat when it twitched as if aware of her scrutiny. "That so?" She mused, eyebrow raising a little higher. "You know, most guys would just say twelve."

"I value precision." He muttered uncomfortably, long fingers fluttering at his sides as if he would like to cover himself, or push her from the room, or anything. But he remained still, _waiting._

"I'll bet you do."

He sighed, pressing fingers to the space between his brows - an acquired gesture to stave off the headaches caused by the stress of social interactions. "Penny, it's a physiologically typical response to a given stimulus, in this case the manipulation of the soft tissues to promote increased circulation and the production of endorphins..." He trailed off, then opened his hands in a gesture of embarrassed concession. "I'm sorry if I've made you uncomfortable."

"I'm not uncomfortable." Penny said quickly, licking her lips. Sheldon darted a glance at her, uncertain. "I'm not." She repeated, a flush coloring her cheeks and spreading down her neck.

"Visual evidence would support an alternate claim-"

"I want to touch you." She interrupted.

He stuttered and gaped, blinking rapidly as if she were an apparition he wasn't entirely sure he was seeing. "I... What?"

She slid forward off the stool, seating herself beside him on the bed, one hand braced against the warm linen at his side, the other resting on his thigh. "I want to touch you." She repeated. She knew how much he valued, how much he _needed_ clear communication; especially in situations where he felt exposed or unsure. So she licked her lips, leaning forward far enough - she hoped - that he would read the sincerity in her eyes. "If it wasn't clear, Sheldon," she teased gently, without malice, "This is a seduction. I'm seducing you." She canted her eyes to the side, blush intensifying. "At least, I'm trying to. Feel free to tell me off if it's not working."

"Penny." Her name was hoarse in his voice, a low rumble she'd never heard from him before. When she raised her gaze to his, he gripped the back of her neck, fingers long enough to support her skull in one hand, and crushed her lips to his.

The kiss was clumsy, unrefined, but with a raw hunger that startled and aroused her from the first instant their lips met - and Sheldon was nothing if not a swift learner. He mimicked her movements, adding careful refinements of flutter and probe and teasing her to give him more, to teach him what she craved. The hand she'd laid on his thigh tensed, pink manicured nails digging into long muscle through the fabric of his pants, and her soft eager mewl vibrated into his mouth. He pulled back, a little startled by her reaction. The scent of her skin settled deep in his hindbrain, the inexorable pull of his baser instincts overwhelming in a manner he could not recall having ever experienced. "I don't understand." Sheldon blurted, an embarrassing admission from such an accomplished mind.

Penny smiled gently. "Sheldon. You know I would never hurt you. You're my best friend." She pressed a kiss to his temple; then, feather-light, to each softly fluttering eyelid. "Relax. Let me make you feel good." The hand on his thigh slid north, tracing first with her fingertips, then cupping the hard length of him. He huffed, his head falling back against the pillow, eyes heavy but trying to watch her. Her fingertips slid beneath the hem of his trousers, flicking the button open deftly and slowly sliding the zipper down. She slid his pants down over his narrow hips, tugging his underwear efficiently along with them. He was abruptly exposed, cool air on his skin making him hiss and move his hands to cover himself. Patient despite the way her pulse picked up at this glimpse of him, Penny lightly encircled his wrists and tugged his hands, unresistant, away.

 _Functional **and** aesthetically pleasing. I'll be damned._ Penny stared, aware that it was rude but unable to help herself. He hadn't been boasting about his size, and his skin was so fair that the head of his sizable erection was a lush shade of mauve that mimicked her favorite lipstick and begged for a taste. She bit her lip, reconsidering - there was every possibility that his delicate sensibilities, already strained, would snap if she decided to put her mouth on his cock. _Maybe next time._ For she was already plotting how to lure the reclusive physicist into her bed again.

She suddenly became aware that he was staring at her as she stared at him, and raised her eyes to his face. He looked like he was biting hard on his tongue lest he speak out of turn or swallow it, and the pink blush that had colored his cheekbones had deepened to scarlet. Blushing that hard, it was amazing he still had enough blood left over to maintain an erection - but he was persevering admirably. Fingertips trailing lightly over his naked skin, down over the crest of one hipbone, she paused tantalizingly out of reach. "Show me what you like."

He took a deep, shuddering breath. "Penny..."

"Please, " She pressed, reaching forward.

He caught her wrist and spoke through gritted teeth. "I doubt you require any tutorials." He informed her in a low voice.

"Hey, rude." She protested, a little put out.

Sheldon swallowed, shook his head to negate her inference and also to organize his churning thoughts. "I mean," he tried again, grip on her wrist relaxing, "That I have been imagining this for so long that I will likely embarrass myself the moment you touch me."

It was Penny's turn to turn scarlet as she goggled at him, flabbergasted at the way the low register in which he muttered the admission turned her insides molten and made a simple statement into the filthiest come-on she'd ever heard. _Oh, girl,_ her brain nattered at her inanely, _You've got it bad._ And she did, she knew; biting her lip as she leaned forward to kiss him again, nimble fingertips dancing over his shaft and making him hiss. Unseen, her other hand crept to the bedside table, to retrieve the small bottle of oil she'd left there. Breaking the kiss - again, that pang of regret at the loss - she warmed a drizzle of oil between her fingers before slicking her hand, digits circled in a snug "o", over the head of his cock.

Sheldon gritted his teeth, eyes shut tight, for a moment looking almost pained. She realized he was trying to hold himself together, a heroic effort for a man as touch-starved as she knew he must be. "Relax," she admonished gently once again, adding a flick of her wrist to her cycle of movements, and he whined, hips bucking into her touch.

"Penny, I..." Mercury and broken glass, the ragged edges of his need evident in his voice.

"Shh," she pressed a kiss to the hot, taut skin over his hipbone and he writhed, gasping. "Come for me."

His body went taut, a soft groan escaping him, sounding somewhat like surprise as his climax ripped through him with a force that was entirely new. Slick heat coated her hand, and she trembled a little, reminded of the raw power she wielded. He panted, by all appearances unable to move, eyes wide and staring at nothing in particular on the ceiling overhead.

Knowing the demands of his active brain would cut through any lingering euphoria, Penny retrieved a soft cloth from the bathroom, running it under a warm tap and cleaning his skin and her own. She tugged the freshly cleaned linens up over his supine form, curling into his side as he found his way back to her.

"I told you the coconut oil would be fine." She teased gently, tracing a fingertip in small, circular patterns over his chest.

"Very funny," he chuffed, still a little breathless. A moment passed, and then he said with some trepidation, "I'm no expert, but I'm given to understand there's a certain degree of give-and-take with these matters... Are you...?" He could not find the words to ask, courage deserting him at the last moment.

Penny smiled. "This was for you, Sheldon." She patted the shoulder she rested her head upon in companionable affability. "We'll do me next time."

She felt him relax, then tense up again, wiry muscle bunching under sensitive skin. _So much for that thirty minutes of effort._ She rolled her eyes, not without affection. They'd get there.

" _Next time?_ "

Eventually.


	3. Under The Same Sky

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In every dimension, Sheldon is himself - only the important things change.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _"There are other worlds than these." - Stephen King, The Dark Tower series_

Despite (or perhaps due to) his many idiosyncrases, Dr. Sheldon Cooper considered himself a whimsical man. It was perhaps unsurprising, then, that he subscribed to the many worlds interpretation of quantum physics. According to the theory, there existed infinite worlds containing infinite versions of himself. This he accepted as a comfortable notion and a likely one. What might have engendered surprise, or would have, had anyone (including Sheldon himself) known about it; was that in one of those worlds, Penny was not merely the charming girl across the hall... But, instead, a much more important celestial body in his orbit.

~*~*~*~

The earliest he recalls wishing for a friend, he is five, red-faced and crying in the time-out corner of his Sunday school classroom. His older brother has long since perfected the art of vanishing into the cornfield on Sunday mornings, only reemerging when the sun dipped low in the sky and his mother called them home for dinner. Missy has pled sick, holding the slim glass thermometer to the glowing lightbulb between their matching beds with a mischievous grin - a trick she learned from him, and pulled off inexpertly. Leaving only Sheldon, trailing obediently along after his mother in his new blue overalls that his Meemaw sewed. 

Sunday school represents a weekly torment that his young mind, still busy analyzing and categorizing the data relevant to navigating the world around him, has not yet discovered a way to avoid. The "teacher" - a term applied with liberal generosity to a church-sanctioned wiper of noses and piercer of juiceboxes - holds him in a deep and profound contempt that often flashes in her eyes when she looks at him. Today's lesson, delivered in her uneducated nasal drawl, covers the raising of Lazarus - a particularly sensitive topic for the budding genius. After coming to the conclusion that neither Santa nor God will return his Pop Pop to life, Sheldon confidently - if a little defiantly - asserts that God must not be as all-powerful as the church ladies and his mother would have him believe. 

Retribution is swift and violent, delivered in a backhanded slap that leaves his trembling mouth red and swollen. Wide blue eyes flooding with tears that stubbornly refuse to spill over, he is banished without ceremony to the time-out stool in the darkest, mustiest corner of the classroom, beneath the rank and rattling pipes that run up the wall and disappear, presumably, into the ancient bathroom beyond. He frowns ferociously, bidding his tears return to whatever childish well of despair they hailed from, jaw clenched and lower lip trembling as he studies the worn and dirty carpet between his light-up sneakers and counts the painted-over cinderblocks on the wall. Possessing a nervous bladder and unaccustomed to corporal discipline - his father's fanatic attentions would come later - he bites his lip and bears the discomfort for as long as possible before his little hand shoots into the air and waves desperately for the teacher's attention.

"I have to go to the bathroom." He enunciates clearly, not wanting to be misunderstood in such a critical moment. His childish face is serious, pale and anxious, high spots of color on his cheeks from the crying jag he'd fiercely resisted. 

The teacher sneers. "Well if you're so smart you should be able to figure out how to hold it a little longer." Behind their beaded-chain glasses, her narrow-set eyes gleam meanly. 

Sheldon is small, but already becoming acquainted with cruelty in others. His round blue eyes large and scared, he protests. "But that's not possible!"

"Quiet." She snaps, and turns her back on him, attending to her other charges and their glitter-glue crosses and fish. 

Coffee Hour, with its crumb cake and bitter brew, is a rare opportunity for her to talk with adults without one or more members of her brood around her skirts, and so Mary Cooper can be forgiven for her tardiness. When his mother finally comes to collect him, little Sheldon Lee is curled into an abject ball atop the time-out stool, blue denim overalls damp and chafing, his face in his hands, sobbing forlornly. He never attends church again.

That night, tucked into his bed with his small train nightlight casting its red-blue-red glow onto the wall, he analyzes his feelings. Crying in the wretched little classroom, humiliated beyond his childish reckoning, he had prayed fervently - not for vengeance, or for deliverance, which would have been logical. But merely for a friend, one voice raised in his defense. One person to keep him from being so completely alone.

The next time the anomaly takes place, he is six, and walking home from peewee football practice on the field behind the high school. It has grown dark while he waited for his father (drunk again; and not coming), and the long road home is intimidating to a small, thin boy who has not yet reached his first growth spurt. The dusty gravel crunches underfoot, the tall rustling trees alive with the chirp of cicadas and crickets, glowing eyes staring him down from the underbrush. a friend's hand to hold on the long, dark walk home would have been a comfort. The heavy football gear clunks painfully against his narrow back; and when he arrives home his mother will still be working, and his father will beat him for his unavoidable tardiness and even more unavoidable strangeness. He bites down on his fist, curled into a ball on the dusty, poured-concrete floor of the cellar, and squeezes his eyes shut as he awaits each blow; unwilling to share his fervent prayer with anyone, not even God.

The scientific theory demands the repetition of any experiment to confirm its validity, and he is freshly eight years old, busily applying himself to the finest high school education Galveston, TX could be expected to give him, the next time he wishes for a friend. Slinking out through the double steel doors and across the schoolyard in the dusty May afternoon, he makes for the bus stop and relative safety - but never makes it, of course. Schoolyard bullies have at this point become well-attuned to the shiver of uncertainty - a hunted animal - he inevitably emits when out of range of an authoritative adult - not that such adults have ever done him much good. He is two-thirds across the yard - far enough from the school that no one will hear or care if he shouts, and yet ever-distant from the bus that will carry him safely home - when they pounce. A trio he has been determinedly avoiding for weeks has finally caught up with him. As they throw him into the dirt, all uncoordinated arms and legs and scattered papers, he hears a shriek he has never heard from a human mouth before. Ear-splitting in its fury, the sound sets the tiny hairs on the back of his vulnerable neck on end, and he keeps his eyes trained on the dirt - _what fresh hell is this?_ It takes him a moment, spitting gravel from a split lip, to realize that the raptor's outraged scream was forming words.

"He's just a kid, what the _fuck_  is wrong with you?" The girl, a total stranger no older than himself, stands between him and his tormentors, howling invective into their stupefied faces. "Leave him alone! Get a life!"

The largest bully chuckles unpleasantly, amused by her petite ferocity, and makes a swipe in her direction. Quick as a flash she sidesteps and grips the muscled arm, climbing the much taller boy like a tree and dragging him to the ground, driving her knee into his testicles as she drops. Springing back from the groaning youth, she dusts herself off and feints aggressively at the two still standing behind him. "Next?!" She snarls, a streak of dirt on her forehead, both cheeks scarlet with fury, blonde ponytail wildly mussed. Sprawled in the dirt behind her, Sheldon is stunned into silence, bloodied mouth agape at this, his most cherished wish answered. It is his first glimpse of Penny, and he knows he will love her forever. 

She is from Nebraska, she explains with grinning pride. Best in her age group at Junior Rodeo, and suddenly her skills at neat and efficient castration make more sense. Her father could not find work in her home state and they sold the farm, moving south to Texas where land was still cheap but skilled labor came dear. Sheldon has never been more grateful for the struggling depressive economy of the heartland states, for it has delivered an angel to his doorstep.

He is fifteen, and he has graduated college, and the fresh dark earth on his father's grave is just starting to sprout grass again. The sight fills him with more relief than it probably should, but if his mother mistakes his silence for grief he will not correct her. He is home to Galveston in the thunderstorms of springtime, the smell of ozone and wet fields cloying in the air and making his shirt stick to his skin as he crosses the creek and climbs the hill to Penny's house, as he has done many times before. The home is sprawling but ramshackle, and under the fickle shade of one chinaberry tree seems to go on forever in the manner of old ranches. He knocks three times, just to ensure she is not home, before turning and trudging down the muddy lane. 

He doesn't see her bolting across the yard from the large rig garage, white tank top streaked with engine grease and a high joyous blush on her cheeks, until she slides in the mud and, laughing, collides with him. "Shelly! You're home!" Not _back_ , but home; and he is. Much as he hates the small town and the way it simultaneously cages and rejects him, home is wherever Penny is. Her very existence tilts the axis of his world, marking his linear path with worrying deviations he cannot bring himself to ignore. Unprepared for her rambunctious assault, he goes down; a lapful of giggling girl pinning him to the damp, pebbled earth. "I missed you so much!" For a long moment she simply hugs him, smelling of rain and rust and apples. She does not offer her condolences for his father's death. She knows he is not mourning him.

"I missed you too, Penny."

It takes him an extra forty-five minutes that night - time that could have been better spent studying - to presoak his clothes by the wan yellow light of the laundry room, carefully scrubbing at oil-stained handprints on the back of his tee-shirt and the streaks of mud on his khakis. He smiles the entire time. 

They are teenagers now, with new problem sets to navigate - very different sets, as she is still attending the public high school, and he has recently acquired his undergraduate degree. He shuts himself away in the evenings to study, poring over the textbooks he will need to further his all-important education - mind craving knowledge, spirit craving freedom; his lofty intelligence the golden ticket for both. Penny prefers more mundane pursuits, riding in the unsafe back of a football player's pickup to some bonfire or swimming hole expedition. Older now and with a feminine sensitivity that she strives to hide, she nevertheless comes to him when boys hurt her, mouth downturned and soft green eyes clearly searching for fault within herself. He listens, seemingly passive; and she doesn't know it but he plants a booby trap in the locker, truck cab or battered gym bag of every one of them. She is sixteen and sobbing into his shoulder, overwhelmed by her father's continuing rejection, her petty and immature friends, the shadow of community college looming on the horizon. Her steady fire is banked low, painful to see it; and though he is stiff and awkward beneath the onslaught of emotions; he vows one day he will make her see herself as he sees her. But she is young, and easily distracted; and by the time she realizes she is falling in love with him, it is too late and he is packing to leave again. Germany, this time, not to return until the following autumn.

He could perhaps have found a better opportunity to tell her. The high school has cast the vote for its homecoming nobility; a distorted fertility ritual wrapped up inside a very modern popularity contest; and Penny has been inducted into the court. Her sunshine-yellow dress stands out beautifully against the emerald green of the cornfields and the brick red of the Petersen's barn, behind which students have gathered to build a bonfire on the hard-packed dirt. Her hair is piled up in careful curls, eyelids shimmering a delicate pink; and it hurts him on a visceral level to see her laugh, full-throated, eyes sparkling, at the Homecoming King's clumsy jest. Perhaps that is why he draws her away, gently tapping on her arm with long fingers, calling her back from the fire's warmth and light to dash her happiness.

"I'm leaving."

"What? Why?" She seems puzzled, "They haven't even gotten out the marshmallows yet." 

"No," he waves a hand, impatient but not with her. Eager to spit out the words he has been holding onto, to get it over with. "I'm leaving Texas. I've accepted a teaching residency at the University of Heidelberg in Germany." 

Penny's smile falters, and guilt scalds him. "Oh... Okay. When are you going?" She can deal with it, loneliness is an old friend when she has no others. Pretty and strong and fiercely competitive, she had not been welcomed with open arms by her peers; and at times, she feels as much an outsider as Sheldon.

"Tomorrow." He looks at the dirt, cannot bear to watch her eyes flash with anger and betrayal. She shoves him, both hands slamming into his thin chest, and he stumbles backward a half-step but does not resist. There is no heat in the action - if she truly intended to harm him, he would be sprawled in the dirt. Through all of it, he keeps his gaze fixed on the ground, terrified to face her. 

"And you're telling me _now?_ What the hell, Sheldon?" Her voice cracks and she is gone, dashing away to the far side of the bonfire, waving off her girlfriends' concern as she fishes a dented can from the red beer cooler. The Homecoming King fixes angry eyes on Sheldon, and he makes himself scarce - though for once, he agrees that he is deserving of a beating.

Bags packed, traveling outfit neatly arranged on the wicker chair in the corner of his room, digital clock on his nightstand counting down the hours to his departure. He stares at the red glow in the dark, aware of the moon as it rises higher in the sky outside his window, aware of Penny's misery in the yellow light from her bedroom window in the house upon the hill. Sighing, feeling hollow inside, he rises and dresses, slipping from the house - he is free to use the front door now, rather than escaping through the window; a man grown in all the ways that matter, or so he would like to believe. He slips across the dew-damp grass and up the hill, tripping once or twice as he steps into snake holes or onto shifting pebbles, and he shivers at the thought of all the dangers awaiting him in the dark. But the light from her window draws him on, and he at last stands beneath it, a handful of smooth round pebbles from the creek bed cold in his hand. He tosses the first with unerring accuracy. _Plink._ No response is forthcoming, so he tosses another - _plink_ \- and another. "Penny." He calls, a stage whisper. _Plink._ "Penny."

At last the window slides up and she is there, tousled blonde hair and eyes red-rimmed - he does not like it, knowing she has been crying. She is silhouetted against the yellow light from her bedside lamp and looks more like an angel than ever, sad and resigned and outlined above him in wan pastel luminescence. "What do you want, Sheldon?"

"I couldn't sleep." He replies honestly, and her expression softens. "Come down, please."

The screen door clatters and Sheldon jumps back, alarmed as her father appears with a shotgun. He raises his hands instinctively, eyes huge in his pale face. "Sir! I-" But seeing the strange slim boy standing in his front yard, Wyatt merely scoffs a little and returns the 12-gauge to its place beside the door. 

"Good luck, kid," he chuckles, and crosses the scrubby yard to the garage; swaying blue-tinted light and the sounds of tinkering spilling out into the night. When Sheldon looks back to the house, Penny is there on the porch; wrapped in a fluffy pink houserobe and barefoot. 

"Do you want to come in?" She offers quietly. 

_More than anything._ "Please." He nods politely, and follows her into the kitchen. There is already a sturdy kettle on the stove; his mother's habit of making tea for every occasion persists here, and Penny retrieves two mugs from the cabinet as Sheldon withdraws the basket of teabags from beneath the countertop with unerring precision. The room is silent for a long moment, homey sounds soothing frayed nerves. The simmer, then whistling from the teapot; and the trickle of steaming water into the mugs. Penny stirs one spoonful of sugar into her cup, then offers him the spoon. He takes two. 

"Why didn't you tell me?" She is not angry, not anymore. Her eyes glimmer with hurt.

He studies his tea intensely, looking for the correct answer. "I didn't know how." He admits finally. "I didn't want to upset you."

"Sheldon." She presses a warm hand to his wrist, startling him into looking at her. "I'm only upset because I'll miss you. I wish you had told me sooner."

 _I'll miss you too._ But the words catch in his throat, he is stuck staring at her hand on his wrist; and when the sun rises the spell is broken and he flies away to Germany, a pressed daisy from beneath her window tucked away in his inside breast pocket. He does not believe in magic, but she is a powerful totem, and he feels he needs all the help he can get.

He does not see her again until he is eighteen years old. University has changed him; in many ways she did not expect. He has reached his full height; a staggering six foot two that makes her have to crane her neck a little to look up at him. He is as narrow as ever, seeming unsure what to do with his long limbs and the awkward angles of his elbows and knees as he folds himself onto the park bench beside her. He is more serious, quieter; as if he had sampled the adult world and to his distress found it as lacking as the adolescent one.

Penny is as lovely as ever; perhaps more so, a red carnation tucked behind her ear as she laughs at her own recounting of some local festival - and its resultant fallout - that he is grateful to have missed. His insides are a hard knot, an icy ball of pain that chokes him with its certainty. He would have to tell her, this time. 

"Penny." He looks at his hands, fingers twisted together in anxiety; and her heart sinks. This is his habit, she knows; turning his gaze away so he cannot, _will not_ see her reaction. Her feelings confuse him, her tears and racous laughter equally unnerving and yet - he has never shamed her for either. She has a feeling that this time, it will be tears. "Penny, I missed you so much." 

The admission is shocking for both of them, and for a moment his blue eyes dart to hers, wide and startled, before he swallows and looks determinedly down again. And she knows. 

"But?" Her voice is soft, tremulous on the verge of parting. If she is being honest, she has always known.

"I've been offered a position at Caltech. It starts in two weeks." 

_But you just got back!_ She wants to cry out in protest; and if he senses the force of will it takes for her to refrain from doing so, he says nothing. Sheldon is no stranger to inner battles of will. "That's really soon." She murmurs instead.

He takes her hand, an unprecedented display of closeness to underline the sincerity of his next words. "Penny, you are my best friend," and his fingers tense at the admission of weakness, expecting a blow to fall while his Achilles heel was exposed. "And I will never forget you. But I have to get out of here." The attack comes from an unexpected direction, falling on his own sword. His goals are everything, have sustained him from his earliest memories when there was nothing else. But then there was Penny, and he has not anticipated how much it will hurt to hold her at a distance; to excise her from his life with surgical precision. 

She is crying, she knows, has not the strength to hide it; but she lets him hold her hand as he hurts her. He is leaving, for good this time; and she has nothing to offer that will make him stay, and she would never force him even if she could. His mind is beautiful and rare and cannot be allowed to atrophy here. "I'm happy for you Shelly, really I am," she gasps, breathless in her tears; and it is Schrödinger's lie, both true and untrue simultaneously - for she is proud of him, immensely proud, and excited for his future; but she is not happy. She leaps off the bench and races away, mumbling some excuse about homework or chores; and he is left in the park alone, sound of birdsong and brisk gusty breeze punctuating the painful thudding of his heart. 

He is almost unsurprised when, lying in bed that night, he hears his window slide open. He sits up, Meemaw's quilt sliding to his waist as he turns with unerring precision to look her in the eye. Penny freezes halfway through his window, eyes wide in the gloom, hair silver in the moonlight. "Sorry," she breathes, soft, soft. "I had to see you."

He waves her into the room, sliding back against the carved headboard his Pop Pop had made, drawing one knee up to his chest in his flannel pajamas. Penny seats herself without preamble beside him, and Sheldon bites down on his tongue - there is a girl in his bed. There is a _Penny_ in his bed. ...His mother will kill him. Her _father_ will kill him. 

That thought, more than anything, keeps his suppressed squeak of surprise from breaking the hush as Penny leans forward and loops her arms around his neck, cuddling against his chest. Her hair tickles his nose, green apple and _Penny,_ and he lowers his head reflexively to avoid the sneeze, jaw instead skating along the warm, silken curve of her neck. Her skin smells of alcohol, and he realizes she has been into her parents' liquor cabinet again, brandy on her breath as she giggles. _Oh, dear lord._ "Penny, what are you doing here?" 

She giggles again, and he thanks whatever cosmic spirit is listening for the fact that his father is dead and his mother self-medicates with cream sherry in her nightly chamomile tea. In no mood to explain herself, Penny continues with her invasion of his personal space. She makes herself comfortable in the chill of an early spring night as she snuggles beneath the quilt, sliding against him; and he swallows, feeling his pulse pick up. _Oh, no._ "Penny," he mumbles, and his hot breath on her neck is more intoxicating than her momma's stolen liquor and more stimulating than any post-dance makeout with some anonymous boy behind the Petersens' barn in the balmy summer night full of fireflies and the crackle of a bonfire. "What - ah!" 

He goes rigid when she touches him, tense and wide-eyed as if he has been caught out in some illicit act. It is a perfectly natural response, but he is acutely aware of the part of him that is not a prodigious scientist but instead only a young man, eighteen years old and hopelessly in love. But she is drunk, and he is leaving; and the moment he has imagined in dreams - against his better judgment and in spite of all his mental discipline - is a pale, dead leaf echo in reality compared to all that he wants and needs. Shutting his eyes, willing himself to intractable coolness, he presses hands to her shoulders - _soft, soft_ \- and pushes her away. He understands what she is doing; her craving for closeness is no secret from him, but he cannot indulge it. He breaks her heart and thinks it a kindness; and she slips away through his window in a torrent of sobs. 

She does not forgive him, will not speak to him when their eyes meet in daylight, and Sheldon cannot blame her. Two weeks pass in a miserable, protracted blur of grey spring rains; packing and repacking his suitcases as if they had been in some manner imperfect the first round. He does not see her, she will not come to the phone - her father's tone a little accusatory as he takes yet another message. But as his twin sister and his Meemaw stand in the driveway, waving farewell from beneath the outspread arms of the chinaberry tree; he sees her come bolting over the crest of the hill, shielding her eyes from the sun as she watched his mother's battered blue Chevy pull away. She waved frantically, white dress patterned with daisies fluttering in the breeze.

He raises a hand, presses it against the cool glass of his window. _Goodbye Penny._ His mouth forms the words, but no sound; regret exhaling in a soft sigh instead.

"Do you want me to give her your new address?" His mother asks, quietly, turning the car onto a tree-lined avenue on the outskirts of town. 

"Only if she asks for it." Sheldon returns, knowing she never will. She has always been stubborn. It is a trait that will serve her well, he thinks - let her resent him until the hurt turns to indifference. It was always better that way.

And he throws himself into his work, holding himself to a routine that is both rigorous and all-consuming; and convincing himself with only marginal success that he doesn't miss her. The air of Pasadena feels thinner, somehow; the sunshine more a watery replica than true gold, and he writes it off as homesickness. He is not wrong.

"I heard we're getting a new neighbor," His roommate chats excitedly as they mount the stairs, Sheldon's daily cardio thanks in no small part to the disabled elevator in the center of the building.

"Oh? I certainly hope they're quiet." Sheldon returns absently, gazing into the middle distance as he worries at an equation that has been troubling him all afternoon. He is so distracted that he barely registers the terminus of their ascent, notices the open door across the hallway much later than his eagerly interested counterpart. 

"Hi, neighbor!" Leonard introduces himself, and Sheldon rolls his eyes - the newcomer is obviously female, if one judged by the artificial bright note in his roommate's tone.

"Hi," the pretty blonde introduces herself with an inborn confidence, setting down the cardboard box she'd been balancing on one hip and stepping forward. She beamed brightly, holding her hand out to shake Leonard's, and Sheldon met her eyes over his diminutive roommate's head, and the last ten years narrowed to the pinpoint gold flecks in her green eyes and vanished.

"...Penny?"

"Sheldon?"

Looking between them, the shorter physicist sensed the binding connection, so obvious it was astonishing that he'd failed to notice it; invisible but as undeniably present as magnetism or gravity. "You want to fill me in?" 

"Leonard, this is Penny." Sheldon explains, in a near-whisper. "She's my best friend."

 _I thought I was your best friend,_ Leonard wants to say, perhaps make a joke, to dissipate the tension... But at the look on the girl's face - part tenderness, part pain - he instead excuses himself to chew over the mystery in the relative privacy of 4A. 

"What are you doing here?" And the question is a breath, blue eyes drinking in the sight of her. She has hardly changed at all - her hair is different, the curls ironed out into a sleek layered cut that brushes attractively against her collarbone. Her face is a little leaner, a little more confident. He is not surprised to note that she is alone in the apartment. It was in her nature to conquer things on her own. "You're not the only one with dreams to chase, Sheldon." She does not call him by his childhood nickname; and while he had wished for years that she would use his proper name, hearing it on her lips sounds awkward and unpleasant.

He presses his lips together, nods, turns to leave. He cannot help the way his body halts him at his own door, turns him back to look at her over his shoulder. "It's good to see you, Penny."

He needs to think, to calculate the probability of her arriving here, blowing into his life like a summer storm not once but twice along its predetermined track. But thinking proves impossible; now that he is aware of her again, wanting to see her with a desperation that had been not forgotten but merely buried beneath the years. He is not surprised when she finds him in the laundry room. She always had a knack for it, and now that her compass needle has realigned she is as accurate as ever. "Did you find what you were looking for?" She asks, and it is a vague and abrupt way to begin this conversation but he knows what she means. A part of him even appreciates her directness - he is tired of being in control, of running away from her.

He shakes his head, setting aside the meticulously folded stack of clean linens. "Not precisely."

"What do you mean?" She seems almost angry, disappointed in him for leaving her behind for no reason at all.

He fixes his gaze on her, more terrified than he has ever been in his life - but he is a man now, he tells himself, and forces himself to say it. "In every aspect of the known universe I have studied, everything I have learned and all the progress I have made, I have never yet found a world, a dimension, a single moment wherein I do not love you."

She frowns for a split second in consternation, as if she does not understand; and then a brilliant smile unfurls like a banner and her eyes flare to life. "I missed you too, Shelly," she teases, tongue bitten between her front teeth in a grin to hold back a similar confession and peals of delighted laughter. She throws her arms around him, and huffs a shuddering, happy sigh into his chest. 

Sheldon feels all his missing pieces click together, spare parts at last assembling into a working heart; and it is like breathing for the first time, that sweet inhalation of fresh air as it had been in that moment on the dusty ground of the schoolyard when she saved him and in doing so made him irrevocably hers. It has been a long time coming but he is, finally - and, he fervently wishes, forever - home.


End file.
